December 21, 2008

If this life were my own and I could choose exactly how I would live, I would want something very similar to Phase 1: either a run-down house or a few shabby tents somewhere with a bunch of random, interesting people who don't give a second thought to when their next meal will be, how much hot water is left, or how many times they've worn the same clothes in a row. We would have sunny cheeks in summer and blustery cheeks in winter and campfires with guitars and beads and braiding every season. When feeling especially creative we would dance and chant around the fire, raising plastic cups to one another, to life. We would read Kerouac and Hesse and break our pastels into tiny pieces, leaving them everywhere they might possibly be found useful. We would have talent shows and dress up nights, paint each other's faces and carve our emotions into branches. On the occassion that we could find a piano we would take turns playing while the others danced around the yard, the field, the forest, the street. We would make up obstacle courses through town, racing barefoot through crowds of society-soaked people.If I could build my own life there would be people. Lots of them. All drastically different, but every single one genuine and authentic, overflowing with a love and acceptance surreal to the surrounding world. There would be music and paint and color everywhere. Nothing would be perfect, but everything would be meaningful to us. We would have crazy nights and calm nights, mornings on porches and mornings in rivers. We would laugh and feel and believe. Nothing would be shocking or impossible. And at the end of our nights we would lay beneath the stars and allow our minds to float beyond the bounds of our own worlds. In the morning we would wake up alongside the rising sun, flutteringly excited to be awake, untamably happy to be alive! We would jump to our feet and run across the lawn, watching the sun rise and listening to the birds sing gleefully of a new day. We would work odd jobs, but never to sustain us. We would be just as content without money as with, because no matter what we had or didn't have, we would live...and never succumb to existence.